Stanford professor thinks you should speak more slowly if you want women to “get” math « Hot Air

Assuming I’m reading this correctly, Professor Boaler isn’t saying that women need to have the material spoon fed to them more slowly then men in order to excel in mathematics. In fact, she’s claiming quite the opposite, saying that the girls are every bit as capable of excelling in speed driven learning environments. The real issue to be addressed here is her conclusion that everyone studying math is overwhelmed with the volume of material they need to absorb, but that women are vastly more likely to give up in the face of the challenge. (There also seems to be at least a suggestion in her article that students of color are equally likely to throw in the towel regardless of gender, but we can leave that one for another day.)

I’m not sure what I would find more offensive if I were a woman reading this article. The old and discredited idea that female brains are poorer at math and science or this new assertion that the girls could succeed in these fields the same as men if they just weren’t so gosh darned ready to give up when the going got tough?